Crazy Eights (Stacked Deck Book 8)

by Emilia Finn

“I never told you that.”

  He flips his menu and reads, seemingly uninterested in me. “Let’s call it intuition. Quinn is also a boy name that can be used for a girl, by the way. Victoria is not. Makes me wonder why you chose that name for your most current ID.”

  It’s clear I’m not going anywhere for the next little while, so I take my menu and start reading. “No reason. It’s a decent enough name, comes with a cute nickname, and I turn when someone says it.”

  “So it’s handy?”

  “Mmhm. I wonder if the chicken burger is decent here.”

  Jamie glances away from his menu, and looks at mine. “Maybe.” He looks into my eyes for a second and grins. It’s small, and doesn’t reach his eyes. But it’s his attempt at friendliness, I guess. An olive branch extended. “Order it, and I’ll get something else. If you decide you don’t like the burger, I can swap with you.”

  “What are you gonna get?”

  He shrugs and brings his menu closer to read it. “Nachos, maybe.”

  “I like nachos.”

  He chuckles. “Then that’s what we’ll do.”

  He looks up and alerts the server that we’re ready, and not more than a minute later, she delivers our drinks and leaves with our order.

  Once she’s gone, and Jamie settles in comfortably and opens his legs obnoxiously wide, he takes a sip of his drink and lets his gaze flick between my chin and my eyes. “I’m surprised you haven’t already asked to go to the bathroom so you can escape out the window.”

  I gasp, loud and dramatic enough that I draw the attention of the guys at the pool table. “I would never!”

  “Liar,” he snorts. “When you inevitably decide you have to pee, you should know that I’ll be coming with you.”

  I lift my nose to the air and shake my head. “You’re not allowed in the ladies’ bathroom.”

  “Well of course not. You’ll be peeing in the dirt outside, silly. I’m not letting you go, Q, so the sooner you stop trying to escape, the sooner we can start getting along.”

  “Whyyyy?” I lament. “Why oh why does this sound like a cheap horror movie? ‘Just relax, Q. Just let it happen. It’ll slide right in’.”

  “Still speaking like a lady, I see.” Jamie slides my Coke closer, then takes his own and sips. “I was always so attracted to your cussing and bad attitude.”

  “Yeah, well, we’re not all momma’s boys, you know? I studied at the College of Awesome for years to reach this level of snark. I even took night classes so I could get the extra credit. You can’t shame me out of it now.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it. I like this song.” He nods toward the jukebox playing a country song that speaks of getting to know a woman. Of having a drink at a bar, dancing, falling in love. “When’s your real birthday?”

  I’ve been training my entire life to get through these discussions with as much smudging as I need for my stories to be convincing – my stint at Hogwarts, notwithstanding. The lies come so naturally to me, I barely even have to think about it. But since I pride myself on annoying him, I return his question and evade mine. “When’s yours?”

  He snorts. “Nice evasion. My birthday is in February. But you already knew that.”

  I lean into his side – because, hell, he’s comfortable – and draw patterns into the condensation on the side of my glass. “I did know that. I may or may not have stalked you after the first Stacked Deck.”

  “Back before you even loved me.”

  Ha. That’s what he thinks. “Which makes you a Pisces. Have you ever studied astrology?”

  “Uh… nope. Can’t say I have.” He brings his soda up and takes a long sip. “Should I have?”

  I shrug. “The star sign Pisces is represented by two fish swimming in opposite directions.” I meet his eyes. My blue, to his brown. “It strikes me as interesting that this is your star sign, because the fish are symbolic of a constant division of attention between fantasy and reality.”

  He frowns, and because we’re in the back corner, the shadows make his brows seem heavier, older… more thoughtful. “My fantasy and my reality?”

  “Mm. Your reality being your family’s fight gym, maybe, and your fantasy being—”

  “You?” he cuts in.

  “Um…” I swallow the nerves that sit lodged in my throat, and shake my head. “No, I was gonna say your hunger to train. Do you still have that guy? What was his name?”

  He grins. “Guy?”

  It takes me a moment for my brain to understand. For my senses to process. “His name is Guy?”

  Jamie only nods.

  “Okay, yeah, him.” Leaning into his side, I study the guys at the pool table and take stock. Their number, their size, their inebriation. “Maybe that’s your division. In reality, you’re the contender. In your fantasy, you’d rather teach.”

  “Mmm. No.” He flattens his lips and takes another sip of Coke. “I’m almost certain my fantasy involves a butt-chinned dancer and her inability to sit the fuck still for more than a week at a time. Now tell me your birthday, and stop deflecting.”

  “February.” I shoot my gaze back to my lap when one of the pool players catches my eyes. “I’m actually older than you. I just never told you.”

  “Really?” Jamie’s hand comes around to my chin and pulls my face around. “You’re older than me? By how much?”

  “Depends.” I hate that his thumb comes down to my chin. That he presses it to my dimple, and tingles shoot straight to the center of my stomach. “What time of day were you born?”

  “Shut up,” he huffs. “Same day? You’re lying to me again.” He releases my chin and shakes his head. “I should’ve known you wouldn’t give a straight answer. It’s like you’re literally incapable.”

  “No…” I slide my hands beneath the table and twine my fingers together. “I wasn’t lying. And no, not the same day. My birthday is the day before yours, which makes me an entire day older than you, give or take a few hours.”

  “But you were born early, right?”

  Nodding, I smile when the server brings our food out and sets our plates on the table in front of us. As soon as she leaves, I dig in and snag a fry. “Right. A couple months early. Drugs, big head; you remember the story.”

  “So really…” He reaches forward and snags a chip from his lake-sized plate. “I’m around two or three months older than you. Technically.”

  “Sure, if you wanna get into the nitty-gritty about when your folks had sex, compared to when mine did.”

  “Gross.” Sitting back, he snags another chip, but this time, he loads it up with beef and guac. “I didn’t say I wanted to discuss the nitties, nor the gritties. I was only establishing dominance.”

  “Of course.” I shake my head and lean forward to check out my burger.

  The bread roll seems fresh and fluffy, and when I pull the top off and check out the chicken patty, I find it steaming hot. Better than rubbery, old, and riddled with salmonella.

  “Your dad’s sperm left the gate before mine did, but I guess you know me well enough to know that I wasn’t coming second to a boy.”

  “Not surprised.”

  “Your mom’s vagina was stretching at the same time as my—”

  “That’s enough of that,” he grumbles. “Fuck. I just wanted to know when your b—” And then he pauses. “That makes you a Pisces too.”

  I pick another fry off my plate and go back to studying the pool table. “Mmhm.”

  “The fish swimming in opposite directions.”

  “Mm. The salt on these fries is awesome, you want some?”

  “I’m reality, Q. And you’re fantasy. Always going in the opposite direction. Always missing each other.”

  “Nope. I don’t believe in fantasy, remember? Hope, dreams, whims, all synonymous with bullshit and naiveté. But nice try.”

  I look back to Jamie when the dude with a pool cue looks a little too deeply, for a little too long. I don’t need to be recognized in this place. Not as the girl w
ith an ass chin, sitting with the guy who offered half a million dollars on national TV.

  Was that only a week ago? Two weeks?

  “What the hell were you thinking, blasting me on TV like that, huh?” I turn in the booth and look into Jamie’s eyes. “What would happen if my parents saw that interview and figured, Hey! Half a mil will get us high as fuck? Or Evan McGrady could have seen it. There were millions of people watching that segment, and you just figured, Let’s blast Q all over the damn country just for funsies.”

  “Not funsies,” he grins. “I got you to call me, and I didn’t have to pay a cent. Like I said, the only people who get screwed over in one of Soph’s traps are the people she targets.”

  “You targeted me?”

  “Mm.” He takes a chip from his plate and loads it up. Then, because he gets off on being obnoxious, he taps my bottom lip and smiles when I accept it into my mouth. “It was so simple, so obvious, I told Soph there was no chance it would work. But alas, I guess she knows you better than I do. You made the call, she tracked you, just like she promised she would, and now here I am, four years after last seeing you, and I’m eating dinner with my girl.”

  “Your girl.” I turn away from him, mad about how arrogant he is, mad about how naïve I was to run straight into his trap, and scoff. “Still delusional I see. Do you still declare love for girls you literally don’t know?”

  “Only you. Do you remember our first date? The time I was teaching you how to hit?”

  “Uh huh.” I pick up my burger, and bite into it, since I can’t bear to look him in the eyes while discussing the time I first made love. My first date, ever. The first time I was ever truly exposed, heart and soul.

  “Tonight feels a bit like a date, doesn’t it?”

  “No.”

  He snickers. “Music, food, and we’ve been hugging a little bit.” He leans in, and presses his lips to my temple. “After this, maybe we could fu—”

  “Nope. No chance in hell.”

  Throwing his head back, Jamie laughs and draws the eyes of Pool Cue Guy and all of his buddies. “You’re so mean,” he teases. “I was gonna say find a strawberry field and go picking.”

  “Yeah, sure you were.” I shrug his arm off and go back to eating. I have a stomach to fill, and then an escape plan to devise.

  Will is going on a suicide mission twenty-four hours from now, which means I have to leave tonight and get back to him before he steps outside again. If I could take a moment to think it all through, I’d be able to acknowledge that even if I left right now and had a fast car, twenty-four hours is still not enough to retrace the distance we’ve already come.

  I don’t have a car, and now that I think about it, I don’t have cash either. But I’m going to try. I’m going to do my damn best to get back to him. Because in this war, Will and I are the only two left in the trenches.

  Selfishly, I don’t want him to leave me all alone.

  Twenty minutes after our food is delivered, I toss the last bite of burger into my mouth, then wash it down with the last of my Coke. Jamie is still working through his food, still sipping, still enjoying his quasi-date. But I have places to be. People to save.

  “Can you scoot out?” I tap his arm and smile my most convincingly innocent smile. “Please.”

  He snorts. “You can hold your pee for ten more minutes. Then we can head outside.”

  “First of all, it’s gross that you think you can decide where and when I get to go to the bathroom. Controlling Boyfriends 101.”

  “So you admit I’m your boyfriend?”

  “No.” I tap his arm again. “Second, I’m not going to the bathroom. I’m going to the bar literally twenty feet away to get another Coke. You’ll be able to see me the whole time.”

  “They have table service here. But nice try.”

  With an impatient sigh and a shake of my head, I twist to my feet and walk across Jamie’s lap. I make extra sure to stomp on his dick, and ignore the tingles in my stomach when his hands whip to my thighs to stop me from falling.

  “Quinn!” he grunts past my weight on his crotch. “Dammit, Q.”

  “I want a drink, and you need to practice not being so controlling. It’s win-win, really.”

  “Quinn!” he growls as I jump to the floor and turn back with a smile.

  Dozens of eyes stop on us. Games of pool pause. Men lean against their cues and watch.

  “Sit down,” Jamie hisses. “Don’t make me drag your ass outta here.”

  “I’m going to get a drink. Want a refill?”

  I don’t wait for his answer. I turn away with a little extra hip sway, thanks to all of my years dancing. I flick my hair over my shoulder, then I move in a way that I learned at Zeus’.

  A woman, no matter her size, shape, facial structure, or weight on the scales, can command an entire room of men if she just knows how to walk. When you’re paid well to dance for men and slide around on a stage, you figure that walk out really fast.

  I lift my chin higher, push my shoulders back, open my chest, and wink for the guy who keeps looking my direction. The fact he looked even when another man’s arm was resting over my shoulder means this guy is dumb as a bag of carrots, but he’s large, and he has a pool cue in his hands.

  Could be better. But it could certainly be worse.

  I strut across the room and stop by the bar, and exactly as I expected, barely twenty seconds later, the guy with a carrot for a brain sidles up beside me so my lungs fill with the scent of sweat and cologne.

  “Say the word, Mami, and we could take ten minutes outside together.”

  Mami?

  Well… not my thing. But beggars can’t be choosers.

  I turn to the guy conveniently wearing a shirt with his name on it, Rodney – I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried – and leaning back against the bar, I make sure my chest is wide open for a pair of eager eyes. “Hi there, Rodney.”

  “What’s your name?” He leans in closer, closer, and when I turn just a little and catch Jamie’s furious gaze, I have to swallow down my schoolgirl giggles.

  “Victoria,” I answer smoothly. “Can you fight, Rodney? You look like you work out.”

  “I work with my hands,” he answers without answering at all. “I’m strong. You want a man who can toss you around?”

  “Well…” I adopt my shy girl act, turn into Rodney a little, and block out the view of Jamie rising from our booth. He’s about to Hulk-smash this place. “I have a boyfriend, but…” I sniffle. “He hits me. I just need to get away, get outside and into my car, but he follows me everywhere I go.”

  “You need a safe space?” Rodney evolves from a bag of carrots into Batman. He steps around me, and holds his pool cue like the weapon it really is.

  I turn and peek under his arm to find Jamie standing just three feet away, with a dangerously ticking jaw and folded arms that are so much bigger than I ever remember them being.

  He looks straight past Rodney, to me. “Coke? Really?”

  “Um…”

  “You don’t speak to her, bub.” Rodney takes a step forward, which alerts his buddies and escalates this situation tenfold.

  I may or may not have messed up. Bad.

  “You like to hit girls?” my savior challenges.

  “Not normally,” Jamie growls. “But right now, I’m kinda tempted. Q,” he looks to me. “Don’t.”

  “I’m sorry, honey.” I really kinda am. “But I can’t be with you anymore. It’s not safe.”

  Four more pool-cue-holding fiends step forward.

  “Q!”

  “I’m sorry.” I start backing up toward the front door. “Remember, keep your arms up. Don’t let them clip your jaw. It’s the only part of your body that can’t be healed easily.”

  “Quinn!” Jamie bulldozes through one of the dumber dudes and slams him to a table with a loud roar. “Don’t! I’m trying to help you.”

  “And I’m trying to help myself. Hands up. Don’t get too hurt.”


  “Quinn.”

  Jamie pivots with reflexes faster than lightning when Rodney steps forward to shove him back. He grabs the back of the guy’s head, slams it to the bar, then he drops him to the ground and steps up to the next.

  “Don’t run, Q! It’s not safe.”

  “Behind you!” From running away to running toward, I panic when a guy sneaks up behind Jamie with his pool cue cocked and swinging like a baseball bat.

  Jamie spins, ducks, and slams his booted foot into his attacker’s kneecap until the guy slams to the floor with a pained grunt. But with two men down, and a woman screeching like an idiot – that’s me, I’m the idiot – what was, for a moment, a one-on-one fight turns into a brawl that involves almost everyone.

  Jamie’s fists swing out on instinct, pool cues are snapped, and some men who had beef prior to my meddling tonight start beating on each other.

  I started this mess, but when a group of four men advance on Jamie at once, I ball my fists the way he taught me all those years ago, I stand by his side and yelp when he pulls me in close – not in restraint, but in protection – and then I swing out when one guy gets close enough.

  I slam my fist to his jaw, cry out when every single one of my knuckles cracks under the pressure, then I swing again when the guy keeps moving.

  “For fuck’s sake,” Jamie grunts.

  He tosses men aside, one, then another, then another. He’s like a bowling ball, clearing the lane and knocking pins to the ground. He keeps me close each time he advances forward, but behind him, so I don’t get hurt by anyone else.

  The damage I do to myself… well, there’s not a whole lot he can do about that.

  Tables and chairs crash around us, blood spurts to the floor from men who have absolutely nothing to do with me, Jamie, or this fight.

  They’re settling their own disputes tonight.

  Curly fries fling into the air when a table is crushed under a brawling pair’s weight. And when a pair of beefy arms wrap around my stomach from behind and my feet leave the ground, Jamie spins at my squeal, and changes from regular pissed to downright homicidal when the guy’s hand cups my boob in a punishing hold.

  It’s like a scene from a Terminator movie, but instead of bullets, pool cues slam into Jamie’s back. He doesn’t seem to feel them. Men try to grab him from behind, but he’s too strong for them. His chocolate eyes look black in this bar, enraged, and ready to kill a man.